Apparatus for mounting a sheet forming part of a musical instrument



- Feb. 3,1970 7 'm'smvum KOISIHIKAWAQ 3,492

APPARATUS FOR MOUNTING A SHEET FORMING PART OF A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT Filed July 1, 1968 FIG.2

FIG.1

FIG.3

Ems) FIG.4

FIG.7

FIG.6

United States Patent APPARATUS FOR MOUNTING A SHEET FORMING PART OF A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT Yoshiyuki Koishikawa, 2365, Kawarada-cho,

Yokkaichi, Mie, Japan Filed July 1, 1968, Ser. No. 741,513 Int. Cl. G10d 13/02 US. Cl. 84-411 Claims ABSTRACT OF THE DISCLOSURE A combination sheet and mounting means for mounting on a musical instrument is disclosed, which comprises a sheet forming part of a musical instrument and an annular peripheral frame having a substantially J-shaped cross sectional configuration consisting of an inner shorter leg portion and an outer longer leg portion for tightly fixing the outer peripheral edge of said sheet, the outer peripheral edge of said sheet being introduced into the annular inside hollow space having the J-shaped cross section of said peripheral frame, the tip of said outer longer leg portion being bent downwardly so that the lower end of the downwardly bent portion may be pressed against the lower bending section of said inner shorter leg portion with the outer peripheral edge of said sheet held therebetween, whereby said sheet is tightly fixed to said peripheral frame.

This invention relates to an improvement in an apparatus for mounting a sheet forming part of a musical instrument.

More particularly, this invention relates to an improvement in an apparatus for mounting a sheet relative to the peripheral frame of a drum or a tambourine.

Heretofore, animal skin has been used for drumheads or for tambourines. Recently, however, as a substitute for said skin, a synthetic resin film such as, for instance, a polyester film has been used. Such a synthetic resin film has good moisture-resisting characteristics and is suitable as a material for such a sheet. However, its thickness is extremely small, being only 0075-035 mm., and it is very slippery. Upon mounting the peripheral edge of a drumhead sheet on a drum body, said sheet tends to be broken and to slip relative to the peripheral frame, and it has been found to be difficult to fix the sheet to said frame tightly.

The present invention has been proposed in order to eliminate such defects.

A primary object of this invention is to provide an improved apparatus for mounting a sheet forming a part of a musical instrument, whereby a sheet can be mounted on the peripheral frame of a drum or a tambourine by a simple structure and the sheet is not damaged by rough use.

One of other objects of this invention is to simplify mounting of a slippery synthetic resin sheet on a peripheral frame, to prevent occurrence of extension and contraction of the sheet due to moisture by making use of the moisture-resisting properties of synthetic resin film constituting the sheet, whereby the sheet can be always maintained in a uniformly tensioned state.

Another object of the present invention is to provide an improved apparatus for mounting a sheet forming part of a musical instrument, the structure of which apparatus is simple and which is suitable for mass production.

In order to achieve the aforementioned objects, the apparatus for mounting the sheet forming part of a musical instrument according to this invention comprises a sheet and an annular peripheral frame having a substantially J- shaped cross sectional configuration consisting of an inner shorter leg portion and an outer longer leg portion for tightly fixing the peripheral edge of said sheet. The outer peripheral edge of said sheet is introduced into the annular hollow space having the J-shaped cross section of said peripheral frame, and then the tip of said outer longer leg portion is bent downwardly so that the lower end of the downwardly bent portion may be pressed against the lower bending section of said inner shorter leg portion with the outer peripheral edge of said sheet held therebetween, whereby said sheet is tightly fixed to said peripheral frame.

According to the present invention, since the outer peripheral edge of the sheet is tightly fixed to the annular peripheral frame having a substantially J-shaped cross sectional configuration consisting of an inner shorter leg portion and an outer longer leg portion by clamping said peripheral edge therebetween along its entire front and back surfaces as mentioned above, the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is uniformly pressed in contact with said peripheral frame over a broad area extending along the entire circumferential length of said edge. Furthermore, since the tip of the outer longer leg portion of said annular peripheral frame is bent downwardly so that the lower end of the downwardly bent portion may be pressed against the lower bending section of said inner shorter leg portion with the outer peripheral edge of said sheet held therebetween, the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is uniformly and tightly fixed to said peripheral frame and is prevented from slipping, and thus the slip of said sheet relative to the peripheral frame due to an external force applied to said sheet and the expansion and contraction of said sheet caused by moisture and dryness are completely prevented. In addition, since the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is tightly fixed to the peripheral frame under an approximately uniformly tensioned state over the entire circumferential length thereof, there is no danger of wrinkles being formed on the surface of the sheet and that the instrument is caused to get out of tune.

Also, according to the present invention, since the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is clamped by the peripheral frame from its front and back sides along its entire circumferential length, the outer peripheral part of said sheet is reinforced and there is no risk that the sheet will be torn from the frame.

In the drawings:

FIG. 1 is a fragmentary perspective view, partly broken out, of a drumhead mounted on a drum according to one preferred embodiment of the present invention:

FIG. 2 is a plan view of the drumhead illustrated in FIG. 1;

FIG. 3 is a longitudinal cross-section view taken along line IIIIII of FIG. 2; and

FIGS. 4, 5, 6 and 7 are longitudinal cross-section views similar to FIG. 3 showing other embodiments of the present invention. A

In FIG. 1, a drum body 10 has an edge over which is mounted a drumhead sheet 11, the outer peripheral edge of which is fixed to an annular peripheral frame 12 made of metal such as, for instance, aluminum and having a structure as will be fully described hereinafter.

Said peripheral frame 12 is initially formed so as to have a substantially J-shaped cross sectional configuration consisting of an inner shorter leg portion 12a and an outer longer leg portion 12b, and after the outer peripheral edge of said sheet 11 has been introduced into the annular inside hollow space having the I-shaped cross section of the peripheral frame 12, the upper end portion of said outer longer leg portion 12b is bent by about so that the lower end of the downwardly bent portion 12c may be pressed against the lower bending section of said inner shorter leg portion 12a to tightly fix the sheet 11 between said respective portions.

Upon mounting the drumhead constituted as described above on a drum body 10, as shown in FIG. 1, the drumhead sheet 11 is positioned over the opening of the drum body so as to close said opening, and on the horizontal part of said peripheral frame projecting outwardly from the outer periphery of the body 10 is mounted an inner annular piece 13a of an annular pressing member 13. A rod having a head 15a thereon extending through an outer annular piece 13b horizontally projecting from said inner annular piece 13a and having its lower end threaded into a hole provided in a mounting member 14 extending outwardly from the drum body 10, is then screwed. The lower surface of the head 15a presses down the outer annular piece 13b of said annular pressing member 13 so that the inner annular piece 13a presses down the horizontal part of said peripheral frame 12 together with the sheet 11 having its outer peripheral edge clamped in the peripheral frame, whereby said sheet 11 is mounted over the open end of the drum body 10 under a tensioned state so as to close said open end.

In the embodiment shown in FIG. 4, the outer longer leg position 12b and the downwardly bent portion 12c of the aforementioned peripheral frame 12 having a substantially J-shaped cross section configuration, which hold the outer peripheral edge of the sheet 11 therebetween, are both further bent inwardly by about 90 together with the sheet 11 therebetween at their upper end portion, whereby the sheet 11 may be more surely fixed to the peripheral frame 12 due to the bent portion 12d, and also the pressing effect caused by the annular pressing member 13 may be further enhanced by increasing the area of the surface to be pressed by the annular pressing member.

In the embodiment shown in FIG. 5, between the inner shorter leg portion 12a and the outer longer leg portion 12b of the peripheral frame 12 is provided a lower horizontal portion 122 of considerable length, from the upper end of the outer longer leg portion 12b is formed an upper horizontal portion 12 by bending it inwardly, from said upper horizontal portion 12] is formed a downwardly bent portion 120 by bending it about a right angle, so that the lower end of said portion 12c may be pressed against the boundary portion between the inner shorter leg portion 12a and the lower horizontal portion 122 to clamp the sheet 11 between these pressed portions. The above-described embodiment is suitable for use with a large size of drum, because the width of the peripheral frame is fairly broadened.

In the embodiment shown in FIG. 6, a projection 12g is provided projecting horizontally at the lower end of the downwardly bent portion 120 of the peripheral frame 12 in the aforementioned embodiment in FIG. 5, and thereby the sheet 11 is held with pressure between the outside edge portion of said projection 12g and the boundary portion between the inner shorter leg portion 12a and the lower horizontal portion 12e. In this figure, a component equivalent to that of the preceding embodiment is designated by the same reference.

Still further, in the embodiment shown in FIG. 7, the projection 12g provided at the lower end of the downwardly bent portion 120 similarly to the embodiment in FIG. 6, is extended horizontally to a considerable length, and thereby the sheet 11 is held with pressure between the inner, lower and outer surfaces of said projections and the inner shorter leg portion 12a, the lower horizontal portion 12c and the outer longer leg portion 12b of the peripheral frame 12. Simultaneously the upper end portion of the inner shorter leg portion 12a is bent outwardly, and thereby the sheet 11 is also held with pressure between this bent portion 12h and the inside and upper surfaces of the downwardly bent portion and the projection 12g. In this figure a component equivalent to that of the embodiment shown in FIG. 6 is designated by the same reference.

What is claimed is:

1. A combination sheet and mounting means for mounting on a musical instrument, comprising a sheet forming a part of a musical instrument and an annular peripheral frame having substantially I-shaped cross sectional configuration consisting of an inner shorter leg portion and an outer longer leg portion for tightly fixing the outer peripheral edge of said sheet, the outer peripheral edge of said sheet being introduced into the annular inside hollow space having the J-shaped cross section of said peripheral frame, the tip of said outer longer leg portion being bent downwardly so that the lower end of the downwardly bent portion may be pressed against the lower bending section of said inner shorter leg portion with the outer peripheral edge of said sheet held therebetween, whereby said sheet is tightly fixed to said peripheral frame.

2. The combination as claimed in claim 1 in which said outer longer leg portion and said downwardly bent portion, which is bent from the tip of the former, of said peripheral frame having the outer peripheral edge of said sheet held therebetween, are both further bent substantially horizontally and inwardly.

3. The combination as claimed in claim 1 in which between said inner shorter leg portion and between said longer outer leg portion and said downwardly bent portion of said peripheral frame are respectively provided a lower horizontal portion and an upper horizontal portion, and the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is held with pressure between the lower end of said downwardly bent portion and the bending section at the lower end of said innershorter leg portion.

4. The combination as claimed in claim 1 in which projections are provided in the horizontal direction at the lower end of said downwardly bent portion of said peripheral frame, and the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is held with pressure between the outside edge portion of said projections and the bending section at the lower end of said inner shorter leg portion.

5. The combination as claimed in claim 1 in which projections are provided in the horizontal direction at the lower end of said downwardly bent portion of said peripheral frame, and the outer peripheral edge of said sheet is held with pressure between said projections and said inner shorter leg portion, said lower horizontal portion and said outer longer leg portion.

References Cited UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,979,981 4/ 1961 Ludwig 84-4ll 3,405,586 10/1968 Koishikaw-a 844l4 3,421,400 1/ 1969 Yokoi 84411 STEPHEN I. TOMSKY, Primary Examiner LAWRENCE R. FRANKLIN, Assistant Examiner US. Cl. X.R. 84-414 

